PHP framework of intermediate complexity, in between CodeIgniter and Yii?

I am a fan of CakePHP. I feel it has the specs you provided. If you want something more cutting edge you can take a look at Lithium

I have found some resources that kindof solve the problem, because they contain examples (Milan Babuškov's sugestion helped focus on "the solution").

Yii playground - examplesYii cookbook - examplesYii blog tutorial - more examples

PS. there is also google - I find solution (and examples) the fastest this way - ex: implement + pagination + yii

I've used both CI and Yii (on my own projects if that makes any difference). CI was my first introduction to MVC, and I found it easy going because it let me use any crappy structure and code. I wrote two full sites in CI (www.insolvencynews.com and www.thebigeat.com if you want to see complexity.)

I had a look at CakePHP but got NOWHERE.

Then I moved on to Yii and, like you, I found it pretty tough and rigid. But I then found that it was so powerful and extensible that I was so much more efficient. When I needed to add a few new features to the old CI sites, it was faster to rewrite the entire sites on Yii than to code up the extra features in CI.

I can't recommend a framework in the middle, but I can recommend sticking with Yii. When you say Yii gets in the way, can you give an example? Looking at DB stuff (in ascending order of dependence on Yii):

1. you can code using PHP's core MySQL functions.

   $result = mysql_query($sql);

2. you can use Yii's DB abstraction layer.

   Yii::app()->db->createCommand($sql)->queryAll();

3. You can use Yii's ActiveRecord:

   Takeaway::model()->findAll();